That’s the number of assassination attempts he has counted since joining the Anbar provincial government in January 2005.

“You see, over there, that is where the suicide bomber tried to kill me,” Governor Rashid said with a smile as he drove his armored S.U.V. to work. Across the road, where he was pointing, lay the charred shells of half a dozen automobiles.

“Over here,” he said after a time, pointing again, “this is where they tried to shoot me.”

Car bomb, suicide bomber, mortar, gun; in his car, in his house, in a mosque: insurgents have tried to kill Mr. Rashid so many times and in so many different ways that he has nearly lost count. But life being what it is in Ramadi, Anbar’s tumultuous capital, Mr. Rashid probably will need a few more lives to survive until his term expires this year.

“They want to kill me,” he said, spinning the wheel, “because I will not let them have power.”

Mr. Rashid stands as the measure of both the tenacity and the weakness of the American-backed government in Anbar Province, west of Baghdad. Like the battered outpost that he calls his office, Mr. Rashid hangs on even as colleagues and friends have either lost their will or, in some cases, their lives.

His predecessor, Raja Nawaf, was kidnapped and killed. His deputy, Talib al-Dulaimi, was shot to death. Khidr Abdeljabar Abbas, the chairman of the provincial council, was killed in April. Last month, the governor’s secretary was beheaded.

Mr. Rashid, 49, survives largely with — and only with — the protection of American marines. They hold down the Government Center and escort him to and from work. They fly him around Anbar in a helicopter. Indeed, Mr. Rashid is more than just the symbol of the Anbar government; he seems the only functioning part. Most of the senior members of the government refuse to come to work or to show their faces in public.

“It’s been very, very difficult to get people to come in here,” said Col. Frank Corte Jr. of the Marines, a reservist and Texas state legislator, and an adviser to Mr. Rashid. “In May, we had a full house — mayors, directors general, contractors — and then came the attack on the governor and the beheading of his secretary. The message went out. Most of them don’t come in anymore.”

Not so for the governor. He is a hulking figure, resembling a professional wrestler. His round head, thick neck and sloping mustache — and his enormous, catcher’s-mitt hands — give him an even more imposing aura. The reality is a bit softer; Mr. Rashid is a civil engineer, a father of seven and husband to two wives.

“I’ve been an engineer for 28 years, and the people know me and respect me — I am related to many of them,” he said. “It is the criminals who don’t like me.”

The Americans hope — and so does Mr. Rashid — that the latest push to break the insurgency here will allow him and his government to begin functioning normally, and thereby achieve some measure of legitimacy among Iraqis. When that day will come, though, seems to be anyone’s guess, including Mr. Rashid’s. The guerrillas show no signs of letting up.

Indeed, by almost any measure, he has a long way to go before he can count on working as a normal executive in a normal province. Much of Anbar is a battlefield, the deadliest place for American troops, who do almost all of the fighting.

Many of the cities have sustained widespread destruction. In Ramadi, the area around the Government Center has been largely obliterated for half a mile in each direction. Many towns provide sanctuary for insurgents. Most areas get only a few hours of electricity each day.

Mr. Rashid described his challenge in philosophical terms, recalling that the Sunni tribes in Anbar never succumbed entirely to Saddam Hussein, either; instead, they fell back on their own traditions. They were doing that now, he said. The challenge was to coax them into the modern world.

“It’s a struggle between old and new,” he said, “between the Constitution and the continuation of anarchy.”

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His troubles go beyond Anbar. The Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad, led by Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, has placed Mr. Rashid and Anbar so low on its list of priorities that $75 million promised for 43 development projects has been hung up for months. Mr. Rashid traveled to Baghdad recently to ask Mr. Maliki to send the money; he is still waiting.

A recent meeting of the provincial government illuminated the depth and breadth of the challenges. Only 6 of 39 senior officials showed up — and those largely because Mr. Rashid threatened to fire anyone who did not. When the meeting finally began at the Government Center marines far outnumbered Iraqis.

“I’m very glad to see your directors general here today,” said Colonel Corte, the adviser, referring to the six Iraqi officials. “They are very brave men.”

One of the first topics was the renovations at several schools, which were being financed and supervised by the Marine Corps. When the marines reported that some work had stopped — on an elementary school in Haditha, for instance — Mr. Rashid grew visibly distressed.

“Why aren’t these schools being rebuilt?” Mr. Rashid asked, looking at the Americans.

“Somebody is threatening the contractors,” a marine replied.

Mr. Rashid shook his head. The schools, he said, had to be ready when the new school year started in September. “We need to put pressure on the contractors,” he said.

“There is a tremendous amount of fear and intimidation,” the marine replied. “We need to be able to say, ‘Your family won’t be killed, your workers won’t be killed.’ ”

Everyone resolved to better protect the Iraqi contractors.

The next topic was even stickier.

The day before, about 10 billion Iraqi dinars, or $7 million, had disappeared from Al Rafidain Bank in downtown Ramadi, next door to an American command post. Al Rafidain was the only functioning bank in Anbar, and the $7 million represented most of the bank’s deposits. That amount of dinars would have filled several large trunks, but no one admitted to seeing a thing.

“There were more than 150 people in the bank that day,” Colonel Corte said. “That doesn’t sound right to me, Governor.”

The governor agreed. “It is hard to believe that with this much military presence next door, they could do this,” he said. “It must have been an inside job.”

Col. Sean MacFarland, an American officer, said: “People’s life savings were in there. Were the deposits insured?”

The governor allowed himself a small smile. “In Iraq, we don’t have that,” he said.

As the meeting ended, an American marine warned of the dangers that loomed the moment anyone stepped outside the Government Center.

“Sniper area — run!” he shouted, and those leaving the meeting ran, indeed.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A10 of the New York edition with the headline: Stubborn Man Tries to Govern In Violent Iraq. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe